New transfer of "Days of Heaven" from Criterion

[Leo Anthony Vale]

There is a school of thought that what's questionable is putting an older original, irreplaceable, spliced negative on a telecine for a home video transfer. Also, some 35mm negs are not single-strand but have A-B rolls.

 

Pre-HD it was normal to make four Xfers of a feature; full screen & letterbox, NTSC & PAL.

 

If the original neg is being Xfered, it would have to be fully color and density corrected.

Timing it for a new I/P would have less wear and tear, it would be hand cranked and go through fewer sprockets.

 

Then there's the wet gate printing for small scratches. Digital wet gate also removes fine detail.

 

The Criterion disc of 'The Leopard' was Xfered from the Technirama OCN.

But that would be either auto-optical or A&B roll. It would have needed extensive post work. Expensive.

[Joe Taylor]

I went crazy today and bought not only "Day," but 2001 HD DVD, The Shining HD DVD, and Clockwork Orange HD DVD.

 

The Days of Heaven release is leaps and bounds above the old 1999 DVD that was until yesterday still one of discs. The new transfer is a bit cooler (I've always been a sap for "the golden look" but it is so much sharper. Looks like it was shot yesterday. I haven't even had a chance to look at the special features yet.

 

Now "2001" in HD DVD is what has really blown my mind. Again, it really looks like a newly released film. I compared several shots back and forth from the SD with the HD and differences are startling. I have stopped, opened, and shelled by SD of 2001 for the last time and feel so damned proud of my shiny new 2001 that I will GIVE the old disc away plus $5.00 to take it off my hands. I drank a few beers watching it, maybe that's why.

[Tom Lowe]

Those Kubrick HD DVDs and Blurays are already shipping?!

 

Oh man, 2001 is gonna be awesome.

[Michel Hafner]

There is a school of thought that what's questionable is putting an older original, irreplaceable, spliced negative on a telecine for a home video transfer. Also, some 35mm negs are not single-strand but have A-B rolls.

I understand that but in the end you have to wonder what camera negatives are for if not being used directly for best digital versions. They don't improve over time, they can only get worse. They can be handled with care so damage is avoidable. It's more about convenience and money than anything else. So maybe this is not the definitive transfer after all. Just a version to be followed sometime later with a proper DI for a 'definitive' digital cinema version. But then again, maybe not. Which brings me back to my original 'worry'.

Who knows, the best version of this film (and many others) in 50 years might indeed be the HD-DVD or BR someone copied onto hard disk and kept copying, The film masters might have perished.

[David Mullen ASC]

Criterion is a home video company, so they are probably not restoring any movies at full theatrical resolution (4K, 2K maybe) but only doing HDTV transfers for home video, hence why usually a studio who owns an irreplaceable original negative would be hesitant to give it to an outside company for an ordinary video transfer. Not unheard of, but unlikely. Putting a 35mm movie onto a HD tape is not an ideal form of digital preservation. More than likely, the 35mm negative of "Days of Heaven" will outlive this HD tape.

 

Besides, a contact-printed IP is higher in resolution than HD -- afterall, the IMAX blow-up of "Batman Begins" was made from an IP.

[Jonathan Bowerbank]

I never got to see Days of Heaven originally in the theatre, but compared to the original DVD version, this new Criterion edition is gorgeous. It's not only a cleaner image, but coupled with the new color contrast and richer/deeper blacks, it's really a crisp and sharp looking film. The first crane shot of the wagons pulling through the gate towards the house off in the distance is breathtaking.

 

I need to watch it again with the commentary, but the supplemental interviews with John Bailey, Sam Shepard and Richard Gere are quite insightful. And the interview with Haskell Wexler seemingly starts out, as is typical of Wexler, with a disclaimer of how he "sees things", or what he perceives to be the truth. But in doing so, he is quite humbled and thankful for the opportunity he had to simply continue Almendros' work on the film. "It's only photography" he states at the end as a resolution to his past prideful and premadonna ways.

[Michel Hafner]

Criterion is a home video company, so they are probably not restoring any movies at full theatrical resolution (4K, 2K maybe) but only doing HDTV transfers for home video, hence why usually a studio who owns an irreplaceable original negative would be hesitant to give it to an outside company for an ordinary video transfer. Not unheard of, but unlikely. Putting a 35mm movie onto a HD tape is not an ideal form of digital preservation. More than likely, the 35mm negative of "Days of Heaven" will outlive this HD tape.

Besides, a contact-printed IP is higher in resolution than HD -- afterall, the IMAX blow-up of "Batman Begins" was made from an IP.

I agree with all of that. Criterion has neither the money nor the inclination to restore films in 4K or make archival quality digital masters for someone else for 'free' (after the rights have expired, what have they got left?). And that film may not be in need of urgent restoration anyway. The issue remains nonetheless. Sooner or later, if the film is considered important enough, a full quality digital version has to be made for archival and digital projection purposes, and going back to the OCN is the proper thing to do. At the same time the public as well should get as good as possible a version in HD (or what follows it) for home consumption. So by combining both requirements you swat two flies at the same time (see "Blade Runner"). Criterion is doing lots of HD transfers of classic films. Even from OCN in some cases. A lot of work that has to be redone sooner or later...

[David Mullen ASC]

Current policy is to store movies for long-term archiving as b&w separations. For a studio's important titles, even 2K and 4K D.I.'s are being recorded out to 35mm b&w seperations for storage.

 

Of course, they are also storing the D.I. itself, probably on LTO tapes, but there is no guarantee that it will be playable or retrievable in the long term.

 

So I suspect that "Days of Heaven" has fine-grain b&w seps in storage for protection, plus the negative, plus an IP.

 

Doing 4K D.I.'s for all old titles in a collection is not currently financially feasible -- it's not even feasible to do all their current productions that way! It will be a very long process of conversion, digital archiving, hence why it is so vital to preserve these film elements.

[Tom Lowe]

Wouldn't it make sense to store 4K DIs and restorations on multiple formats? Back them up on every medium that could handle it, then make fresh digital copies every five years or so?

 

What is the lifespan of a typical harddrive, for example?

[David Mullen ASC]

That's a lot of work for a bunch of generally underfunded and understaffed archives...

 

I've heard estimates that if an entire movie archive was digital, you'd have to be copying over many titles per day just to keep the whole system on a 5-year cycle of updating. Again, unless it is automated, both in copying and confirming the accuracy of the copy, then the staffs at archives are not big enough to handle the work (often these archives have a couple of archivists and some unpaid interns working for them.)

 

Generally, the ideal system would be two digital copies of the movie in two different locations, for safety. I don't think using multiple formats (LTO's, hard drives, optical disks, etc.) is really feasible.